i don't think it's as simple as steve just dismissed it. these love letters or disagreement over some love letters to israel. real national security issues at stake. senator hagel was opposed to sanctions against syria. one of a handful of sanctions -- >> i want to get steve to respond to you on that. i want to throw in this issue. what is a bigger issue for chuck hagel among democrats? some of these issues involving israel on iran. he brought up ben carden, we know that there's some question frank lautenberg, chuck schumer, democrats like that. but there's also been what he said about james hormelback in 1998. i know you have done am some extensive conversations with chuck hagel about anti-gay thing. barney frank was very offended by this. just this week said i cannot think of any other minority group in the u.s. today where such a negative statement would not be an obstacle to a major presidential. >> he has apologized for the statement and hormel in a very large statement, a gracious statement accepted it and said, this is really importa